Totally unrealistic helicopter FM...
 

Ouch

ups...

different view

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JXEJ7PSoUKo

I'd like to see the insurance claim statement, "I swerved to miss a cat..."

Nasty, doesn't actually look like he hit anything to cause it either?

What was reported at the time was that he hit a cable. I was surprised the way the heli just seemed to fall apart like that. Torque from the rotors perhaps?

yeah, my guess is that he hit something that chopped off one of the rotor blade tips: the structural failure is due to the rotor imbalance, surely he was lucky to be at very low altitude..

Choppers are nasty things to be in when something goes wrong..

I saw this accident on the news- the footage they used was a slightly different angle. From that angle you could see him chop a steel cable and nearly get flung out of the cabin as it spun in. I've not been able to find this footage online unfortunately, but it was obviously a very risky maneuver. The investigation report will make interesting reading.

u can see how it happened here, at 0.08 seconds u see a cable blowing into the central rotor hub. That is how it occured.

http://uk.news.yahoo.com/helicopter-...003652526.html